Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!apple!bbn!bbn.com!cosell
From: cosell@bbn.com (Bernie Cosell)
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: Re: Reading others' files (Was: Ten Commandments ...)
Message-ID: <42794@bbn.COM>
Date: 16 Jul 89 18:14:20 GMT
References: <12702@well.UUCP> <TALE.89Jul15133947@imagine.pawl.rpi.edu> <26368@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <TALE.89Jul15222812@imagine.pawl.rpi.edu>
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Reply-To: cosell@BBN.COM (Bernie Cosell)
Distribution: comp
Organization: Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc., Cambridge MA
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In article <TALE.89Jul15222812@imagine.pawl.rpi.edu> tale@pawl.rpi.edu writes:
}In article <TALE.89Jul15133947@imagine.pawl.rpi.edu> I wrote
}tale> If you've got something to hide, go ahead and hide it.  Save yourself
}tale> from the consequences.  I am really opposed to this fellow telling me
}tale> that I am practising immoral computer activity, though.
}
}In <26368@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> mwm@eris.berkeley.edu (Mike Meyer) writes:
}mwm> Well, you are. Or maybe you are. Or maybe you aren't.
}
}mwm> This topic comes up at irregular intervals. The answer is "it depends
}mwm> on the environment you're in." It also depends on what you're doing,
}mwm> and why.
}
}Yes, I realize all that.  My complaint, however, is that the fellow
}who wrote this document presented it as gospel.

The implicit part (in my reading) was "without permission" --- the world
(obviously) couldn't work at all if his rule really meant as you've chosent to
interpret it.  That is, if you believe it to be as strict as you asserted it,
then your complaints are unnecessary: his 'commandment' is unworkable and
stupid in ANY environment.  If you make the reasonable interpretation that he
was talking about "without permission", then I think his rule stands, and makes
sense.  That *your* environment might have some generally-understood 'blanket
permissions' is fine... it doesn't affect the validity or applicability of his
rule (any more than being a beta tester and being allowed to keep the software
for free in exchange constitutes a "don't use it if you don't pay for it").


}Most of my work is in
}a university environment on Unix machines.  Most people who would
}speak about the "spirit of Unix" (much the way that "spirit of USENET"
}is discussed) readily state that permissions of 600 on files which
}don't contain sensitive data (e-mail, .netrcs, et al) are quite in
}violation of this "spirit".  Some would even argue more strongly that
}permissions of 644 are still too strict; I am not one of that some but
}I see why they say that and support their _ideals_ if not their
}practises.   Yet this fellow comes along and says that I can't look in
}files that aren't mine with no exceptions ... he just says "don't do
}it".   That is my complaint regarding this part of the Ten
}Commandments which were posted.

Please spare us the nonsequitur into this mythical "spirit of Unix": (a) it was
not mentioned, implied, referenced or has any other connection with the topic
at hand, and (b) no such 'spirit' exists.  There are some unix shops that run
themselves professionally, and others that run like high-school-playgrounds and
others everywhere in between on the spectrum.  And that applies to most other
operating systems, too --- unix is hardly special.

  /Bernie\